The Importance of Sunday Mass for the Family

Prof. Louis Aldrich – Taiwan

28 March 2006

The whole of Sunday, as the "day of Lord," as a day of celebration, rest and solidarity, is important for the sanctification of the family.,  But in our busy modern world, with its demands of work and the overwhelming opportunities for secular recreations and entertainments, it is difficult for families to find time to spend together.  In this context, Sunday Mass is of critical importance in helping families become conscious again that  they are a community of baptized persons, each a child of the Father; that they are a domestic Church called to evangelize and serve.  In our secular world, Sunday Mass is the family's spiritual center for renewing and deepening Faith, increasing Hope, and providing the strength for the life of Charity.  Further, it is especially important that members of the family not isolate themselves in a private relationship and mission from the Lord, but experience their common mission in the family and with the Church as a whole. To summarize John Paul II:     Sunday  is a celebration of the "living presence of the Risen Lord in the midst of his own people."  To  properly proclaim and live out this  mystery, it is inadequate for believers to simply "pray individually and commemorate the death and Resurrection of Christ inwardly, in the secrecy of their hearts." Christians are saved not as individuals alone, "but as members of the Mystical Body." The Eucharist's ecclesial dimension is "expressed most especially on the day
when the whole community comes together to commemorate the Lord's Resurrection."   For Catholic families, Sunday Mass is an "outstanding expressions of their identity and their ministry as "domestic churches, when parents share with their children at the one table of the word and of the Bread of Life."  Hence, it is first of all the mission and responsibility of the parents to teach their children how to participate in the Eucharist; catechists assist parents in this mission.

Under the proper circumstances children's  Masses can be a great help in this mission. I can perhaps share briefly our experience with Children's Masses at the local Sacred Heart parish here in Taipei.  Following a program developed by a congregation of Sisters devoted to catechetics, three
times per month we have a Mass for children followed by catechism; once a month the children join the larger community Mass.  Usually the parents of smaller children attend the Children's Mass.  Parents, especially non-Catholic spouses are offered adult catechism while the children attend their own catechism courses. This Mass, because of the participation of children in all parts of Mass, especially the singing, is both joyful and fairly disciplined.  While it is a sacrifice for parents who are often working overtime, and for students who are often attending numerous cram courses, to spend the whole of Sunday morning around Church, it is obvious that they continue to come because they experience growing union and solidarity as a family and spiritual fruit
of joy: as Pope John Paul II tells us, "Sunday, as a weekly echo of the first encounter with the Risen Lord, is unfailingly marked by the joy with which the disciples greeted the Master: 'The disciples rejoiced to see the Lord' (Jn 20:20)." (Dies Domini, 56)